Comment on Chaos, Comedy, and 'Crying Rooms': Inside Jimmy Fallon's 'Tonight Show'
matchphoenix@feddit.uk 9 months ago
Rolling Stone contacted more than 50 Tonight Show employees, past and present, during the reporting for this story. After reaching out to representatives for Fallon and NBC, Rolling Stone reached out to an additional 30 current and former staffers. While many of them praised Fallon’s immense talent and comedic gifts, not a single one agreed to speak on the record or had positive things to say about working on The Tonight Show. Nor would any of the program’s nine showrunners since 2014 comment about the program’s namesake on the record – they wouldn’t even give statements of support, as is common in the entertainment industry.
Holy shit. When no one will say a single positive thing about you on the record, you must be an absolute menace to work with.
xyzzy@lemm.ee 9 months ago
I’ve worked in environments like this before. The reality is most (not all) very rich people I’ve worked with are terrible people within their own fiefdoms. Many are emotionally abusive to people who report to them; some are also narcissists and sociopaths.
I didn’t last long in those cases unless the money was very good, and even then sacrificing your mental health and personal life is probably not worth it. People work in places like this for a year or two for the perceived prestige or to satisfy their childhood dream, then burn out and go somewhere more sane. Unfortunately, there’s a never ending supply of warm bodies for roles like that. Many industries are built on that assumption: film and television, fashion, game development, etc.